Doctors 'botched surgical procedure on girl after carrying out op by light of an iPhone'

Doctors botched a surgical procedure on a 13-year-old girl after carrying out the minor operation by the light of an iPhone, her family have claimed.

Georgia Henderson was left to wait for six hours in a waiting room with blood pouring from a lesion on her lip - known as a pyogenic granuloma - and was only handed gauze pads to stem the flow, it was said.

When a doctor finally arrived to see her he took her into a small room off the waiting room and told her he was going to perform an excision surgery to remove the lump.

Then they got an iPhone torch and shone it on my lip and were trying to cut the lump off

Georgia Henderson

However Georgia and her mother Kathryn were horrified when the consultant allegedly asked a colleague to shine the torch from his iPhone onto her lip so he could see clearly to perform the procedure.

Georgia's lip was cut, then stitched and she was allowed to leave Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary, but when she arrived back home she saw the lump had not been successfully removed.

The teenager, from Whitley Bay, said: "I was in the waiting room for about five or six hours with my lip constantly bleeding, they kept handing me gauze but it wasn't stopping the bleeding.

"When the doctor came down they took me into a room and then numbed my lip with an injection.

"Then they got an iPhone torch and shone it on my lip and were trying to cut the lump off.

"They stitched it up but looking at it afterwards it is still there, they haven't taken it off they didn't really do anything."

Georgia developed the lump last year and was first treated at Newcastle Dental Hospital, where surgery was performed to remove it and a biopsy was taken which revealed it to be the pyogenic granuloma, a harmless overgrowth of tiny blood vessels on the skin.

A few days after the dental hospital surgery the lump returned and Georgia was taken to the RVI where it was frozen. But that night it began to bleed uncontrollaby and Kathryn took her back in the following morning.

Her mother said: "She waited so long to be seen, it was a relief when they finally came down to treat her.

"But then the consultant pulled out his iPhone and handed it to a colleague and asked him to hold it while he cut the lump from Georgia's lip.

"This has become a real problem for her, she has had to miss school, it was affected her confidence and everything."

After complaining to the RVI about the unsuccessful operation, she was referred by the consultant to the dental hospital - who in turn referred her back to the RVI.

In desperation the family tried to get the operation done at a private hospital, where surgeons declined to operate on Georgia due to her age.

The youngster said: "My confidence has been affected, I just want rid of it, I'm conscious of it all the time.

"I have to be careful not to knock it as it then bleeds continuously and that restricts what I can do with my friends."

A spokesman for Newcastle Hospitals Trust said: "Our staff work hard to try to provide the best possible care to all of our patients all of the time.

"Patients in our emergency department are seen in order based on their clinical need, with the most seriously ill patient being treated first.

"We strive to see all patients within four hours of their arrival, but there are some occasions when that is not always possible and we will explain that to patients at the time.

"Our doctors often use pen torches to get bright light onto an area and a doctor may have used an i-Phone in the same way, getting bright directable light to better illuminate the area.

"We are unable to comment in detail on the individual care we provide to patients, but if a parent is unhappy about the treatment we have provided to their child we would urge them to talk to us."

Georgia is now on a waiting list to have further surgery, to remove the lump but has been told it could take months before she is seen again.